If Only Catharsis
by Amarissia
Summary: Hisoka makes a terrible bargain with Muraki, in order to obtain Tsuzuki's release. Serious M for adult content, non-con.


_Not a new one, but new to the site, only seen on LJ before now. This is my first and thus far only Yami No Matsuei fic, and it is DARK. Non-con and adult stuff ahead. Tread lightly._

**IF ONLY CATHARSIS**

Hisoka's chest felt like iron as he walked over the fallen leaves, every breath in and out a nearly painful effort. Even for dusk, the park was strangely deserted, and despite the eeriness of the atmosphere, the loneliness was a mercy. Hisoka was too tense to properly dampen his empathy, and the thoughts of even a small crowd would have pierced him like needles. Or knife wounds, like the ones he felt in his heart. Tsuzuki captured by Muraki, again, the repeat of the doctor's sick cat-and-mouse game. At headquarters, Watari and Gushoshin were researching possible hide-outs and Tatsumi was no doubt gnashing his teeth and being sabotaged by his worry.

Hisoka was supposed to stay near them and rest; as Watari had said, their exhausted Bon would be no use to Tsuzuki in a state of near-collapse. But the young Shinigami couldn't stand it any longer, and for one of his great spiritual power, it was easy enough to sneak away to this Kyoto park, and easy enough to do what he came here to do.

_Tsuzuki always protected me. Even in the beginning, when I pushed him away and thought him an idiot, already, somehow, I mattered to him. He risked his life for me without hesitation_, Hisoka remembered, shifting suddenly as the discomfort in his chest spiked. A cold heart can feel no pain...damn Tsuzuki for thawing it.

It should be easy enough to call to Muraki, the boy knew, as they were connected by the curse that remained etched even in Hisoka's spirit body. Normally he tried not to think of this part of himself, but now he closed his eyes and delved into the memory of pain and force. A trace of the cruel doctor lingered in it like a calling card; Hisoka activated it and called. Without words, with only defiance and urgency and a touch of fear that he couldn't hold back. He was certain Muraki would come, but the sudden sensing of another presence and a cold hand caressing his cheek still triggered panic. The boy's eyes flew open and he fell back onto the soft grass, instinctively edging backward.

"What's wrong, bouya?" Muraki asked with a predatory smile. "_You_ called _me_, after all. Are you lonely without your dear partner?"

"Give him back," Hisoka hissed, his pale eyes flaring with green fire.

"Why should I? It pleases me to have Tsuzuki-san close. Especially when the memory of all the blood on his hands renders him catatonic with guilt, and I can touch and handle him as easily as a - "

"Stop," Hisoka gasped. Even without physical contact, he could see the doctor cradling Tsuzuki, undressing him, catching his tears on smiling lips. "Stop, please."

"Very well. Poor child, so sensitive. And you don't even have your partner to hold you and tell you it will be all right. Tell me, has dear, damaged Tsuzuki-san discovered yet what comfort there is to be found inside you? Have you writhed and come for him as you did for me?"

Ignoring the stab of those words, Hisoka got to his feet and fixed the doctor with a defiant and furious glare. "You can get to Tsuzuki whenever you want, right? Your powers are that great?"

His ego pleased, Muraki smiled arrogantly. "Yes."

"Then you won't lose anything by letting him go now. You'll get to chase him all over again, and you enjoy that, don't you?"

"Clever child. Yes, I suppose so, but I ask again, why should I? What are you offering in exchange for his release?"

His fear screamed in protest, but Hisoka held his head high and didn't hesitate. "Anything."

"Anything? Really." Muraki came a little closer, drinking in the boy's fear and desperation. "Very well. I will release Tsuzuki-san, if you agree to willingly come with me. For this night, you will be mine."

It was what Hisoka had expected, but his stomach still twisted with nausea. "How do I know you'll let me go when the night is over?"

"You don't. You'll have to trust me. But consider, if Tsuzuki-san has to come rescue you from me again, he will hate me even more. Why would I want that? Especially since I can get to you too, whenever I wish."

That was intended to chill him, and it did, but Hisoka refused to cower. "Fine. Agreed. But let Tsuzuki go first."

Muraki closed his eerie silver eyes, and the surge of energy in him made it clear that he was at least doing _something_. About a minute passed, then Muraki looked at him again just as Hisoka's cell phone rang. He dug it out of his jeans pocket and flipped it open. Tatsumi's voice, both frantic and relieved, greeted him.

"Kurosaki-kun, where are you? Tsuzuki appeared out of nowhere, fast asleep on the floor of my office."

"Is he all right?"

"Watari's checking him over, but yes, he seems to be. Where are you? You left without a word, we've all been worried."

"I'm sorry, Tatsumi-san. I'll be back in the morning."

"Kurosaki-kun, what's wrong?" Tatsumi asked tensely, knowing something wasn't right. "Where are you? We'll come get you."

"I'm fine, sir. Tell everyone I'll be back tomorrow."

"Did you - " Tatsumi began, but Hisoka turned off the phone and put it away. Muraki was approaching, and he couldn't run, there was no use.

"Don't worry," the doctor said softly, taking his time advancing on the much smaller boy. "They won't be able to find you where we're going. I don't want any interruptions. It's been too long since I had you obedient and willing beneath me."

"You _never_ had me willing," Hisoka hissed, his fists clenching. "I fought you."

"Only the first time, my pretty doll." Muraki smirked at the boy's confusion and shock. "Oh, you don't recall all those lovely encounters we had in the hospital? Such beautiful nights, when the moonlight poured through the window onto us, and you lay drugged and enchanted on the bed, knowing nothing but the pleasure I gave you."

"You..." Hisoka couldn't get out any more words. His time in the hospital, those nearly three years leading to his death, was a hazy blur, and the nights especially were practically blanks. But he never imagined Muraki had been there too, taking advantage of him again. True, it had been Tokyo Hospital, where the doctor easily had access to patients, but he couldn't have...it couldn't be true...

"Don't believe me? Let me show you." Muraki was closer, reaching for him. "A little preview of how much you'll enjoy this night."

"No, no!" Hisoka shouted, but it was too late. His body was held against the doctor's, Muraki's lips against his ear, and the memory was unlocked and flooded him like a tidal wave, complete with the drowning sensation.

He was thirteen, fourteen, fifteen again, weak from illness and drugs in his hospital bed. Muraki was there, too many nights to be counted, removing the boy's pajamas or hospital gown, and his hands were everywhere, both inside and outside, far gentler than they had been the night he cast the lingering-death curse. The sensations of those nights spilled into Hisoka as he remembered, drowsy numbness made into exhilaration, nothingness kindled into heat, and pleasure pleasure pleasure as his kind doctor entered him carefully, stroked him, sucked him, all the while whispering "Good boy. Good pet."

It was too much, Hisoka was overloading from the force of recollection. He screamed, but there was no one to hear it, and it faded into a whimpering moan as he came in his pants and collapsed against the doctor in a dead faint. Smiling, Muraki lifted the unconscious boy to cradle him in his arms, and disappeared.

_mthmthmth_

When Hisoka woke, he thought it must be a nightmare, though he hadn't dreamed at all in his sleep. The room he was in was dream-like, with white walls that shimmered and faded in and out and didn't seem to be either there or not there. The large bed was also all white, from the wood to the tied-back sheer curtains to the silk sheets and pillowcases. Even Hisoka's attire, pajamas that he vaguely recalled from the hospital, was white.

The only color in the ghostly room came from bits of pink that were scattered all over the floor, the bed and Hisoka himself. Still in the process of waking, it took him a moment to realize that they were fresh petals, and that the scent of sakura was heavy in the room. From human-world cherry trees, not the kind in Meifu that he had grown used to but the kind he would always associate with his innocence being wrenched from him. Panicked and sickened by the smell, Hisoka weakly pulled himself off the bed and stumbled to the room's one door, a short walk that just about sapped his remaining strength. Naturally, it was locked.

"You're not trying to leave, are you?" The voice made Hisoka whirl around, and there was Muraki standing by the bed. He let a single petal drop from his hand, and it fell slowly to the floor. "You wouldn't break our agreement, surely."

"I can't...why...why..." The young Shinigami's big green eyes darted around the room, at the white, the pink petals, the clothes he had been dressed in.

"I thought it all very appropriate. This room is much nicer than a hospital, isn't it? Sakura has a special meaning to us, and the smell of it makes me hungry for you. As for the pajamas..." Muraki made an amused 'hmph' noise. "I've been saving them for an occasion just like this. They were what I removed from you the last time we came together. It's almost as though we're picking up where we left off, isn't it? But now I don't need to drug you or cast a compliance spell on you, so maybe you'll enjoy it even more."

"I won't _enjoy_ it," Hisoka growled, his back flat against the door. "I know what you are now."

"Do you really, bouya?" Muraki was inching closer, and there was no way to keep distance between them. "I don't think you do. But I know what _you_ are. Since that glorious night, I have known. You are my doll, a beautiful toy made for my enjoyment."

Cold hands cupped Hisoka's face, and the boy whimpered and shuddered, closing his eyes but unable to block the lust flooding his empathy, unable to move. Lips brushed his blond hair, his forehead.

"A doll who feels so much," the doctor murmured. "There's been so much pain, hasn't there? Let me show you something better..."

Muraki's fingers had the pajama top unfastened in a heartbeat and eased it off. The bottoms hit the floor in a pool of fabric around Hisoka's ankles, leaving the boy nude before he knew what was happening. The doctor lifted him as easily as a real doll and held the pale body against his own, graceful limbs dangling, fists weakly pounding against his shoulders in protest. "No," the child cried, "no", but Muraki smiled indulgently, like a parent trying to enforce a bedtime.

"Now, now. Remember our agreement. You are mine tonight. Mmm, bouya, I think you've grown a little since that first night. But you won't grow anymore. That pleases me."

Unperturbed by the futile struggling, Muraki held Hisoka easily, and leisurely carried him back to the white bed. Then he shifted the boy so he held him bridal-style, and gently lowered him to the silk pillows and blankets. Foolish child, he tried to get away, but Muraki grasped his slender wrists in one hand, and with the other traced the boy's quivering lips with a soft pink petal. The way Hisoka twisted and struggled awoke pleasant memories and a stirring of arousal in Muraki's groin, and he quickly straddled the nude teenager and pinned his arms down. Ah, such fire in this sacrificial lamb. Even through tears, he blinked them away and glared defiantly.

"What happened to your word, bouya? If you won't fulfill your side of the bargain, perhaps I should just go reclaim Tsuzuki-san now."

Instantly Hisoka went still, letting his arms go limp. The defiance turned to pleading, and he whispered "Don't, please, I'll...I'll..."

"You'll behave for me, as you promised? I know you will, pet." Muraki released his wrists. "Unbutton my shirt."

Though his hands shook and fumbled, Hisoka breathed out a quiet sob and obeyed. The doctor shrugged off his jacket, meanwhile, tossing it aside. Then, with a smile that pretended kindness, he helped Hisoka with the remaining buttons, cradling and caressing the smaller fingers and kissing them one by one when they finished. Once his shirt was removed, Muraki pressed Hisoka's palms to his chest and made them run up and down the sculpted torso. The sight was enough to make most men and women drool, but the boy flinched at the touch as though the marble skin burned him.

"Still unwilling, my doll? Not for long. You merely require the proper attention and care, and soon you will beg me to take you."

Muraki leaned forward until he was directly over Hisoka's top half, and with one hand under the slender back and another beneath the nape, he enfolded the boy beneath him in strong, careful arms. His lips and tongue explored the sensitive skin of jawline and neck, and made Hisoka shiver as he sucked and lapped at the unsteady pulse. Silver hair, fine strands of moonlight, brushed at the teenager's shoulder like the beckoning fingers of some merciless god.

"Remember," Muraki whispered, "remember the heights of rapture I took you to in those years when you could feel nothing else. All day you would lay like a broken toy for the nurses to fuss over, weakening as my curse slowly sapped your lifeforce. But in the nighttime, in our time, my pretty doll, you came alive and surrendered to me a hundred times. Will you surrender now? Make it easier on yourself?"

"No," Hisoka gasped. "_No_!"

"That's all right. You came to me willingly, after all. I'll take care of the rest. Just relax."

"Just get it over with!"

"No, pet." The squirming was futile; Muraki's large hand was between Hisoka's legs and kneading gently. "I like to see you bleed, but that's not what tonight is about. Don't hide from me. Let me hear your pleasure. Look at me with those innocent eyes."

"Nnn...no..."

"Look at me." Something in the firm voice made him unable to blink or turn away, and Muraki smoothed his tears away with a secretive smile. "Good boy. Now let me hear you. Moan for me."

"Nnn," Hisoka refused through lips pressed together.

"Feel, then. Feel what I feel."

It couldn't be avoided, the emotions were even more palpable than the shared body heat. Lust, want, obsession, innate sensuality that the shedding of blood could never quench. Wrapped in the doctor's overwhelming senses, Hisoka shivered and swelled unwillingly in the hand that was playing with him. A fingertip gently probed the slit, worked it until a drop of wetness emerged. Muraki then deftly slid down the fragile body, licked the fluid away, and continued.

Hisoka choked out heaving sobs as his legs were pushed up, and he was instructed to put his hands behind his knees and hold them like that. Fingers beneath his testicles bounced them a few times, then departed, ignoring the boy's erection to trace the muscles of his slender thighs, then to cup the child's smooth white bottom in both hands. Muraki lifted him like an

_sacrifice_

offering, and made hushing noises as long thumbs spread him open. The doctor smiled hungrily. Just as warm and wet and pink inside as he remembered, and he couldn't wait any longer to feel it again. Muraki quickly slicked one thumb with saliva and began to carefully insert it, leaving behind a smear of wetness on the porcelain curve. A beautiful cry rewarded him, of fear more than pain, and the tight heat drew him in further to the place he knew by heart. Hisoka's lower body thrust up in an instinctive escape attempt that backfired, only increased the pressure that he wanted to flee.

"Ohhh, ohhh no, no - " the boy moaned.

"Enjoy it, bouya, that's it. A little more, take it in...good..." Muraki slipped the other thumb into the heat of his favorite doll, and slowly used them to stretch the tight space and rub against the prostate.

"No, no!"

"Why do you say no? I know it feels good, pet. Let me hear you moan. I won't tell anyone." Increased pressure, and the sound Muraki wanted came unwillingly. He smiled cruelly. "I've missed that. The way you screamed and cried beneath the sakura trees was lovely, but I grew to enjoy your compliance in the hospital. You were so weak, I could make you do anything I wanted. Open your pretty mouth for my kisses, put your arms around me, tighten yourself around my cock. Sometimes I didn't let you come for hours, and then you wept with relief."

Hisoka squeezed his eyes shut and pretended he was somewhere else. At a meeting, listening to Chief Konoe's gruff, barking voice. Being waved into Watari's lab with an excited shout of "Bon, take a look at this!" Watching Tatsumi scold Tsuzuki as waves of concealed affection radiated from him. Tsuzuki. Tsuzuki's kind purple eyes, his soft voice too often self-deprecating, his hugs that were so cautious and careful, like he was afraid of hurting him.

_Tsuzuki, I want Tsuzuki_, Hisoka thought, for once not berating himself for the weakness and stupidity of needing another person. _Tsuzuki...I'll keep you safe...like you do for me..._

Hisoka was jolted miserably back to reality by the touch of cold lips on his forehead and eyelids. With his thumbs still circling the prostate, Muraki nuzzled the tear-streaked cheeks and laughed softly.

"You bring out peculiar feelings in me, little one. Usually I like to break my toys, but you're so wounded, I find myself wanting to comfort you." The icy lips brushed over the boy's mouth and flicked at it with a hot tongue. "Open for your doctor, bouya, I'll kiss and make you all better."

Hisoka turned his face away and clenched his teeth and lips tightly together. He would let Muraki take him as agreed (not that he could stop it now even if he wanted to) but he would not make it easy, and he would not make it intimate.

"Stubborn child. I suppose I'll have to take my kisses elsewhere."

For one insane, hopeful moment, Hisoka thought that Muraki was going to get off him and go find a new victim. He didn't have time to feel guilty for that spark of relief before his hands were made to hold his knees up again, and Muraki was between his thighs and lifting him off the mattress. But there was just enough time to form a horrible guess about what the doctor was about to do. Sure enough, the thumbs spread him open again, and something hot and wet snaked its way into him. Now Hisoka screamed in protest and tried to thrash, but he was held too tightly, and there was no pain to distract from the stimulation.

Muraki inwardly laughed in triumph. The boy had never been able to resist his skill in this, and was actually thrusting forward for more, though he probably didn't realize he was doing it.

_No pain_, the doctor thought loudly, knowing the child would hear. _Not this time. I can take good care of my dolls when I want to. I know it feels good. Tell me._

It did, Hisoka couldn't force any denial across this unwanted telepathic connection. Muraki could hear his screams and sobs, though, mingling with those of that night beneath the red moon that cast a bloody light on the cherry trees. Other images too, of a stern man and woman casting menacing shadows into a cell where a beautiful boy was curled up alone. Hisoka pushed this memory away and clung to one of himself crying quietly in Tsuzuki's embrace, all the while trying to hide those thoughts from Muraki.

_Oh no, bouya. You will think of _me _tonight, not him. Much as I love Tsuzuki-san, I do not share my dolls, even with one another._

Continuing to flick his tongue, Muraki slathered his fingers with lubricant and had two inside the moment his tongue was withdrawn. It amused him that the lack of pain was confusing the child. It was rare for the doctor to enjoy sex without hurting someone, but this absolute control made up for it. Besides, though he had bedded many, he had rarely seen anything as beautiful as this favorite doll undulating serpent-like on his probing fingers. Hisoka was undeniably hard, eyes rolling back, whimpering like something newborn and needy.

"Does it hurt, little doll? Tell the doctor where it hurts." Muraki removed his fingers to slick himself, and smirked at the cry of loss this prompted. "It doesn't hurt. You'd rather it hurt. You don't want to need this, but you do. When I'm through with you, you'll lay awake every night, groping this pretty body of yours and imagining your hands are mine, giving you what you need. Maybe in desperation you'll let sweet Tsuzuki-san comfort you, and when his perfect skin is against yours, holding you close, filling you up and spurting inside you, you'll both remember me. You don't have to admit it, bouya, it's enough that we both know. You want this. Ask me. Beg me for it."

The pale-pink flush was becoming on the porcelain skin, the petal lips moist and panting, eyes hazy and heavy with arousal. This creature was made to be hurt, only that could explain how seductive his shimmering tears were. Such a fragile child, no wonder his colleagues coddled and protected the young empath. It was this doll-like delicacy that had, before, made Muraki want to crack it and make it bleed, but this was even better. Life was more intimate than death, pleasure more binding than pain.

_Tell yourself you just want it over, bouya, if that's what you need to do_. Muraki pressed himself against the prepared boy, rubbing the tip of his weeping erection against the tight entrance. _You need to come before I let you go, and you cannot come until I do. Your body remembers its training, even if you don't. You need me inside. Ask me. Ask and you shall receive._

Impressive, Hisoka was still denying what he required, shaking his head so that clumps of damp blond hair flew from right to left and back again. The doctor cupped a wet, fine-boned cheek with his large hand, caressing so gently that the Shinigami actually turned into the touch, without thinking, only clinging to the comfort offered. Anything was better than recognizing the hardness between his legs, the erection pressed against him, the irrational and shameful thought that everything would be all right once it was inside him...

"Tsuzuki hasn't had you, has he? His sickening conscience entices me almost as much as his beauty."

Hisoka jerked away from the caressing hand and glared at his captor. Muraki only smiled, knowing how protective the two Shinigami were of each other.

"And no one else at the Ministry has tried? Not the idiot scientist who stares at you when you're not looking? Your chief has been able to resist the sweet young piece of jailbait right under his nose? The secretary hasn't tried to use you to take his mind off Tsuzuki?"

"Don't talk about them!"

"So they have all resisted. Impressive, given the way your lovely body emits a siren cry to all who see you, begging to be undone and abused and _taken_. All your short life, bouya, you've felt the eyes on you, haven't you? Eyes of strangers and of people you know well, undressing you and imagining wrestling you to the floor and unleashing the little whore that lives behind your innocent eyes."

Hisoka shook his head and thrashed against the arms that pinned him, not to say no but to beg the doctor to stop. It was true, he still felt eyes wander up and down him when he had to walk among humans, heard and saw the perverted thoughts of passing men who fantasized about luring him away and raping him. But Tsuzuki was usually there, with his good-natured concern drowning some of the noise, his protective arm around Hisoka's shoulders and his whispered promises that it was okay, he wouldn't let anything happen to him.

"Oh, my poor doll, I've made you cry again. Did I strike a deep chord? Was one of those staring admirers your daddy, perhaps? Did he lock you up because he feared your powers, or the chance that he might lose control and make you his concubine?"

"Shut up!" Hisoka screamed, not caring that his voice was near-hysterical. He had little love for his distant father, but he would not let Muraki taint even that.

"Another nerve, precious? Were I him, blood kinship would not be enough to stop me either. I would have raised you for this and kept you all to myself."

Hisoka's stomach turned and shook with disgust, partly because the doctor was imagining such a scenario and enjoying it. The boy turned from these unwanted images and found, in a part of his memory he rarely probed, a few recollections from his early childhood, when he'd still been his family's pride and joy and his father's most prized treasure. It hurt to remember being held...nearly as much as it hurt to be held now.

"Please...just get this over with." Hisoka's voice was defeated, his usual power and conviction replaced by the wounded child that he was. "I'll do anything, just finish this and let me go."

"Tell me how much you want it first," Muraki instructed, stroking the young one's soft cheek with his fingers. "Beg me for what you need."

"I...want..." Hisoka couldn't make himself sound eager, he could hardly choke the words out at all, but the doctor was patient. "I want you, Sensei, please. I need you to...to..."

"To take you, little doll? Beg me. I need to hear you."

"P-Please take me. I beg you, Sensei." The child was shaking in his encouraging, petting hands. How pretty, to watch this doll shatter and never lose any of its beauty. "I n-need you inside m-me."

"You've never had anyone but me." Muraki edged the head of his erection just barely inside, parting the cheeks with it. "Only I can satisfy you."

Muraki began to enter, giving the boy a little at a time. Hisoka whimpered and closed his eyes, until his chin was grasped and he opened them to find the doctor smiling through arousal-heavy breaths.

"Listen to me, bouya. I know you will enjoy this, and so do you. I want to hear the pleasure I give you, not protests or pleas to stop. Show me how much you love it, or we'll do it again until you get it right."

The Shinigami's grass-green eyes flooded with horror, and his mouth worked silently. Muraki smiled, and took this chance to kiss him, leaning down and pushing his tongue between the lips easily this time. When he drew back, he brushed away the fresh tears and made cooing noises of sympathy as he pet the boy's uncommon blond hair.

"Don't be embarrassed. No one but us need ever know the heights to which only I can bring you. Just enjoy this, bouya, and then you get to go home."

The first thrust came in slow motion, but the effect of it was devastating. Hisoka had been determining that he would fake enjoyment to avoid a repeat of this, but there was no need - a cry burst out of his throat as Muraki sheathed himself fully, and not one of pain, though it was full of hurt as well. The doctor had had years to explore this little body and learn how to manipulate it in any way he liked. Clutching the puppet's strings in his cold hands, Muraki worked in an unusually gentle rhythm and made his pretty toy writhe. The boy's face was especially fascinating to watch, beautiful in pain and semi-consciousness but even more exquisite in this combination of denial and desire.

A heat the likes of which Hisoka had never known was spreading through him, as though he had gotten too close to Suzaku. This was a slow overload like the kind people's feelings caused in him, making his spirit-energy surge and crackle and threaten blackness, but the only emotions were his own. At least the first time with Muraki he had been too young to understand what was being done to him; there was no mistaking sexual pleasure now, however unfamiliar with it he had remained. Logically Hisoka knew his body was being used against him, but he was an empath, made to feel, and the shame of this made him wish for a second death.

Muraki guided the Shinigami's slender arms to wrap around his neck, and lifted the boy a little for better leverage. Now he could put his face against the baby-soft skin, the fine golden hair, and breathe in, revel in, this favorite of all his many conquests. The pure, sweet scent of sakura, and not from the scattered petals. It wafted from the boy's very soul.

"You can do better than that," Muraki taunted into Hisoka's ear, though the little cries of pleasure were constant and very nice. "You want to go home, don't you? Show me your strength, bouya, if you have any."

"Fill me," Hisoka fired back, defiant through a flood of tears. "Harder, faster. Hurt me."

"Clever doll. No pain to hide behind, not this time." Muraki emitted a groan as the heat around him tightened. He slowed down to avoid tearing the boy, rolled his hips so that he pressed as much of the prostate at once as possible, and Hisoka relaxed with a needy moan. "Good boy. How is that? Tell me."

"Good," the teenager whimpered, resigned to having to play this game. "Please, Sensei, give me more."

"Of course, pet, anything you want. To whom do you belong?"

"You, Sensei. I - I only want you."

"Good bouya. Only I can give you what you need. You need me to come, don't you? Tell me how much you want my seed, doll."

"P-Please come in me, Sensei. Please fill me, I want to feel it..." Hisoka broke into fresh, quiet sobs as the doctor's body shuddered and released a wave of wet heat into him with a cry of triumph.

Rather than being exhausted, Muraki was exhilarated, as he always was just after climax. He hoisted himself off of his trembling victim and withdrew his softening length, smiling with anticipation of what was coming next. The doctor kneeled astride the boy and tied his wrist to the bed's headboard with white satin ribbon. Hisoka fought this, but too weakly to break free.

"Ssh, bouya, nothing to be afraid of. I just don't want you obstructing my view. It's your turn now."

Muraki pushed Hisoka's legs apart and eyed the thus-neglected erection. Excellent, he thought as a drop of fluid trickled from the swollen head, the doll remembered his lesson and could not come without his master's permission. Muraki laid his hands on the boy's flat stomach and stroked it, working down to the soft white skin of his slender inner thighs, purposely not touching the place that most needed attention. Every whimper that filled the tense air now was one of pleading, and no wonder. Three years of training prior to the child's death worked as well as a cock ring would, and no matter how much stimulation he was given, the doll couldn't release in his presence until he was told to. Though Muraki had never been able to resist long enough to know for sure...

And he knew he would not be able to hold off this time either. True, the sight of the young Shinigami aroused almost to the point of hysteria and writhing was one he could happily look at for hours. But though Hisoka was the empath, it was Muraki who could feel _his_ urgency, the height to which he had been raised and desperately needed to plunge from.

_Oh, you'll fall, my pretty toy, always. And I will always be the one to catch you, and you will always want me to be. Because you were born for this. Born for me, and me alone._

"No," Hisoka wept, having heard every word. A tongue lapped at his nipples, and he shivered despite the warmth of both bodies and the room. Muraki put his face close to Hisoka's, breathed in his desperation for a few moments more, then locked his hypnotic gaze on the watery green eyes.

"Come. Now."

There was no chance and no free will to even consider refusal. The world and the death-colored room exploded into a blackness of pleasure and screaming. Hisoka felt vaguely (everything was vague) that he was being drained of himself to the point of emptiness, and briefly sensed that he was out of his spirit-body and hovering over it. He watched with sadness and a numb, detached horror as his body spasmed and released thin ropes of white that disappeared against the white of the room and their skin. Then, the falling sensation he'd known would come, and Hisoka found himself back in his own shaking limbs and, far worse, Muraki's arms were holding and warming him.

"Sleep," caressing lips whispered into the boy's ear. "You don't need to be awake for the rest."

And the kind blackness returned.

_mthmthmth_

Hisoka woke before his eyes opened, recalled to life by the sensation of other people with him and their personalities and feelings that were coming into focus. The closest one felt like Watari, though his usual vitality was dampened by worry and affection and anger that he was mercifully keeping repressed. Timidly, Hisoka probed into the next room where the other three were.

Chief Konoe was easy to pick out, he was the one Hisoka could hardly sense, for a reason the boy did not know but had always been grateful for. Repression beside him, that was certainly Tatsumi, who was now bottling up not only his adoration of his former partner but an outrage that spilled over his barriers and made Hisoka quickly shy away. Even without reading the room, he knew who the third was. Where the chief's emotions whispered, Tsuzuki's screamed. Hisoka hated touching the darkness and remorse that lay in his partner's heart, but he had to see if it was any worse, if Muraki had hurt him. The young Shinigami put his focus on Tsuzuki, and -

_**FURY RAGE BLACK HATE REVENGE **__I'll kill him how could he how could anyone why please don't have done this for me Hisoka I'm not worth it __**DEATH DEATH DEATH**_

The misery and fury clouding Tsuzuki filled Hisoka up like a thick fog, and he couldn't help emitting a cry of pain. Immediately a hand was on his forehead, smoothing his blond hair back.

"Ssh, you're safe, Bon, you're home, everything's all right now." Gentle Watari, trying to soothe. "Can you open your eyes?"

He didn't want to, but the concern pulsing in the scientist's skin made Hisoka feel guilty. Slowly, hesitantly, he opened his eyes to find Watari hovering over him and smiling. Hisoka tried to smile back, but the effort made his eyes sting, and he turned his head so the tears would disappear into the pillow. Watari made a sound not unlike that of a worried mother bird, and first drew his hand back, but seemed unable to keep from attempting to comfort. He continued to carefully stroke the golden hair as Hisoka clenched his fists and ordered himself to regain his composure.

"Sorry," the boy murmured unsteadily. "I just don't like this room, I'm fine." It was half-true, Hisoka disliked every part of the infirmary. It too much resembled the hospital.

"Bon," Watari said sadly, "you were missing all night, then you just appeared on the floor in my lab. I brought you here and cleaned you up while you were asleep. I'm a doctor as well as a scientist, Bon, and I had to tell the others what kind of injuries you had. I won't examine you again if you don't want, but tell me, have you healed up? Are you in any pain?"

_"No pain to hide behind, not this time."_

"Not hurt," the young Shinigami whispered, curling up and prompting the petting hand to withdraw. "I'm not hurt, I wasn't hurt."

"Oh, Bon." A wave of affection radiated from Watari, and pity that made the boy grit his teeth. "Bon, we know. We know it was him."

"It wasn't, it wasn't - "

"Bon." That damn word again, that cloaked way of saying 'child'. "We found these all over you...as well as his DNA."

The usually-jovial scientist held up a plastic baggie full of what first resembled confetti. Pink, harmless enough, curling into one another like animals seeking warmth. Sakura petals, and not the kind that were available in Meifu. Their delicate, pale pink was worse than the white of the room.

Hisoka tried to say "Please don't tell Tsuzuki", but of course he already knew what happened, and why Hisoka had allowed it. Besides, the boy couldn't choke up the words, only make pitiful noises that were like gasps and whimpers, like simply the sound of hysteria. Hisoka shook his head dumbly but that didn't stop Watari. The scientist put his hands on the boy's shoulders, still trying to comfort, and slid them down to rub his arms over the long sleeves.

Long sleeves. With a louder cry of dismay, Hisoka shrugged Watari off and roughly pushed up one of the pajama-top sleeves, praying that the ornate web of red lines wouldn't be there. But it was, fading and already hardly visible, but he could see it, and worse, he could feel it. Stronger than ever before, he could feel Muraki under his skin like a second heartbeat. Without thinking, he began to scratch at his polluted forearm, tearing at the marred flesh with his fingernails.

Alarmed, Watari grabbed his wrists, and flinched at the cry of fear this prompted. "No, Bon, don't do that. I'm sorry, but if you try to hurt yourself I'll have to sedate you."

Hisoka winced at Watari's sadness for him, and buried his face in his hands, determined that he not be seen crying though the sound of it was plainly audible. He didn't hear the commotion approaching from the next room but felt it, darkness and confusion and panic coming closer, closer -

"Hisoka! He's awake! I've got to see him!"

"Tsuzuki, he's in no condition - "

However good a Shinigami, Tsuzuki was led by his heart, not his head, and all that softened the dark feeling in him was the love and need to protect that he felt for his young partner. Pulling free of Tatsumi, shoving past Watari, Tsuzuki gently touched Hisoka's bowed head and trembling shoulder. He had intended to throw his arms around the boy, but Hisoka's resulting scream was like nothing any of them had ever heard come out of his mouth.

Tatsumi yanked Tsuzuki back and held him up as he slumped guiltily, whispering assurances that this wasn't his fault. Hisoka was thrashing, eyes squeezed shut and streaming tears, flailing his limbs as though fighting an invisible assailant. Watari ducked the flying fists and somehow managed to administer a syringe of sedative. He then stepped back, and as they watched, Hisoka slowly quieted and went still, and in less than a minute was deeply asleep and blissfully unaware.

"My own special blend," the scientist said dully. "It dampens his empathy as well. He won't dream, and he won't feel. For a while."

"Go ahead," Tatsumi murmured to Tsuzuki, releasing him.

"I hurt him. Just being near him, I hurt him."

"It's not your fault."

"He did this for me," Tsuzuki whimpered, shrinking back as Tatsumi's arms supported him from behind again. "Muraki hurt him because of me, and he let him because of _me_..."

"Stop," Tatsumi said firmly. "You know how Kurosaki-kun feels when you do this to yourself. What's done is done. He needs you to be strong now."

"I know...but..."

"He did this to protect your sanity. If you fall into darkness again, you will make Kurosaki-kun's sacrifice a vain one, and Muraki will win." Tatsumi felt Tsuzuki straighten up and inhale with determination. "Good. Now go to him, while he can't sense you."

Now that his mind was made up, Tsuzuki moved cautiously but without hesitation. He sank down onto a seat on the bed, and put his hands on the boy again, emitting a sob this time to get no reaction. He lifted Hisoka carefully and held him in a protective embrace, pressing his nose and mouth and gushing eyes to the blond hair sweetly perfumed by human-world cherry.

"And you say I'm the idiot," he whispered. "Don't you understand? I don't care what he does to me. You've been hurt enough, I can't bear to see you hurt any more."

Tatsumi watched this, his calm face hardened with repressed pain. He wanted to run, to hide from Tsuzuki's despair as he had for so long, but forced himself to remain still. What Kurosaki had sacrificed for Tsuzuki astounded him; he would honor that and him by coping with this ache.

"We'll get him," Tsuzuki was saying softly. "I promise. I'll kill him myself for what he's done to you. I'll show you a death, at last, that won't rip me apart. I'll show you...I can be strong too."

Tears streamed down Watari's heartbroken face and fell in droplets on his lab coat. He and Tatsumi exchanged glances and nods, and both of them quietly left the room, giving the partners privacy. In a corner of the waiting room, Chief Konoe was facing the wall, hunched over and shaking with silent rage. One of the Gushoshin brothers hovered nearby, looking into space with a heartsick, all-too-human expression.

The scientist and the secretary took seats side by side, keeping near one another purely out of instinct. After a few moments, Watari produced the bag of petals from his lab coat pocket and dumped its contents onto a small, low table. His usual methodical manner dulled by grief, he spread the pink petals out and began to shred them to pieces, as though it were the most natural thing in the world to do. Tender-hearted Tsuzuki would wince at this, at the destruction of anything that once lived, but Tatsumi watched with a strange satisfaction and a wistful thought.

_If only catharsis were really this simple._

_mthmthmth_

In the hour he spent left alone with his unconscious partner, Tsuzuki used this time to take control of his emotions, or at least try to. He knew his constant guilt and darkness was sensed by Hisoka, though he shielded most of it, and this new remorse should be no different. Tsuzuki was determined to emit only love and support and understanding for Hisoka when he awoke. The boy would probably interpret this as pity and refuse it, but better this than the rage Tsuzuki felt toward Muraki, and the frustration at Hisoka for putting himself in danger.

_Don't let him sense this. _After all, how could he be angry at someone who was literally hurt by anger?

Holding Hisoka like this, in a way he'd never been permitted to before, did a lot to ease Tsuzuki's wrath. True, mentally Hisoka was the more adult of the two of them, but his body remained sixteen, and small for a sixteen-year-old, since he had hardly grown in the three years of illness preceding his death. Under the hospital clothes Hisoka was mostly bones beneath his white, baby-flawless skin. Tsuzuki nuzzled his face into and kissed the honey-blond hair (so rare for a native Japanese, like the grass-green eyes) and choked back a fresh wave of sobs to think...to think...

_He was this size or even smaller when Muraki attacked him the first time. Just a child, gods, a child that even my weak arms can easily hold. Unloved, feared by his family, Hisoka had been through enough. How could anyone harm something so innocent and sweet and beautiful?_

Tsuzuki was so deep in his thoughts that he didn't notice the boy's very slight shifting that signaled the beginning of wakefulness. He eased Hisoka's head to lay against his shoulder and watched the porcelain skin crease and smooth with whatever troubled him in this dreamless sleep. Tsuzuki himself always felt dirty after being caressed by Muraki...was Hisoka also feeling soiled? He couldn't, he _couldn't_, Hisoka was purity personified, a purity that Tsuzuki had always been drawn to. Maybe it was for that reason, or just that he had always wanted to, but whatever the rationalization, the elder Shinigami felt inexorably drawn closer to the boy's face.

Wrong, it was so wrong, the timing, the very act, all of it. But Hisoka's soft lips felt like absolution, like heaven, like something newly born and purely, unalterably good. Tsuzuki's mouth lovingly explored their satin surface first, then the lips were moving with his own, opening to offer wetness and heat. Tsuzuki slipped his tongue inside only long enough to lick at Hisoka's, then he retreated a little, waiting, until Hisoka returned the kiss. The boy made pleading, mewling noises that Tsuzuki answered by cradling him close and keeping the kiss slow, a hot but carefully controlled fire. His conscience snapped out of its trance and was about to yank Tsuzuki away in shame when Hisoka's arms went around him just as desperately, and a hand was sliding into his dark hair.

Hisoka was awake, but he wasn't pulling away or yelling, though he had every right to. He was panting, eyes sleepy but unquestionably open, kissing all over the mouth that ravished him and whispering "Tsuzuki, Tsuzuki", not in blame but in need. Though worried, Tsuzuki couldn't deny him this, not when he seemed so sure, especially considering that Hisoka had never been very comfortable even with platonic touching.

The boy was taking a little control now, letting his lips wander to Tsuzuki's jaw and up to his ear. Tsuzuki in turn couldn't resist this opportunity to taste the delicate curve of white neck and the bit of shoulder that the pajamas had shifted to reveal. The elder Shinigami put his mouth and nose to this skin, moaned in pleasure at the smoothness and clean-youth smell, and the taste of it on his tongue and the shivers he prompted as he traced wet paths and sucked gently at a few tender spots. Hisoka moaned to encourage him, arching to give better access and holding Tsuzuki's head where it was. Hisoka was spreading himself out like an offering, a wanton gesture that his youth and past made innocent, and gods he was so small and fragile...

Tsuzuki lifted his head, lips grieving the loss of that sweet skin, and instead tried to speak. "Hisoka," he managed, and shifted the restless body so that he held it like a child, tucking the head beneath his chin and stroking the fine blond hair. "Hisoka..."

"Nnn," Hisoka shivered, clutching his partner tightly, to Tsuzuki's frank surprise. "Stop, stop. I don't want your guilt, Tsuzuki. Just you."

"I'm here," the elder said lovingly. "Let me hold you. Even if you really want more than that, you're not ready. You're safe now, rest."

"Nnn..." The soft groan was really a sigh of pleasure. "I feel how you feel. Don't lock it away again, let me feel it..."

Tsuzuki let his unconditional and boundless and not entirely chaste love for his young partner flow outward, and Hisoka sighed again and let himself be gathered close. He felt so perfect in Tsuzuki's arms, against his chest, nuzzling at the collar of his white suit shirt. The crying that followed came on slowly, beginning with barely audible whimpers and peaking with sobs that nearly tore Tsuzuki's heart out to hear. He clamped down his rage at Muraki and hid it beneath his other feelings, only letting Hisoka sense his love, a love that didn't blame him and could never think him unclean, no matter what Muraki had done or could ever do.

When the crying had faded and gone silent, Hisoka edged his head away from the elder's neck to rest it on his shoulder, and looked up with wet green eyes. They were probing with a hint of wariness, a remnant of the old distrust he'd once had toward everyone, but Tsuzuki smiled, openly and with adoration, with nothing to hide. After a brief pause, the boy returned a weak shadow of that expression.

_I love you_, Tsuzuki thought, loud enough so it couldn't go unheard.

"You don't need to shout," Hisoka said softly, with a hint of his characteristic grumpiness, and Tsuzuki laughed.

"Well, I was always afraid to say it before."

"Baka. You've been shouting it for a long time."

"Sorry," the elder Shinigami said sheepishly. "I tried not to."

"Baka," Hisoka repeated, and it was spoken so softly and fondly that Tsuzuki beamed to hear it. "I...I..."

"You don't have to say it."

Hisoka shifted a little, getting used to being held like this. "Give me a little more time, okay?"

"As long as you want. You know, you don't have to _feel_ it either. It's okay."

"Baka," the boy said again, but smiled. "Sometimes I forget...you can't hear _me_..."

"Hear you?"

"Shouting."

Hisoka curled his hand around the back of Tsuzuki's neck to draw his head down. Their faces lingered just barely apart for a moment, noses touching, and then their lips were together and their soft sighs mingled so that neither could tell who was making what sound. When Hisoka paused, Tsuzuki withdrew a little and grinned.

"You shout all the time. You're always yelling at me."

"Because you care too much. You allow yourself to be hurt."

"I do, huh?"

Hisoka frowned with annoyance and continued to shift. "My arm is getting numb."

Regretfully, Tsuzuki lowered him back down onto the pillows. "I can go if you want me to."

In reply, Hisoka edged to the right, leaving room for another body, and patted the bed in invitation. Brightening, Tsuzuki accepted, laying down on his side as Hisoka was, so they could face each other. The scent of cherry blossom lingered faintly, just under the clean linen smell, and Tsuzuki wished he could banish it forever. Banish every bad thing as easily as his fuda spells dissolved the monsters and curses they had faced.

Hisoka's hand lay on the mattress as though in wait; Tsuzuki gently squeezed it. "Do you want to talk about it?"

"No." Hisoka moved closer and allowed an arm around him, maybe as compensation for his answer.

"Maybe later?"

"Probably not." Traces of Watari's sedative lingered. The boy's voice had grown heavy with sleep, and the warmth beside him relaxed him into a feeling of safety. "Don't worry. The more he hurts us, the more incentive I have to overcome him."

_Us_. Tsuzuki ignored the flutter in his abdomen (not hunger, for once), and spoke with as much firmness as he could gather. "You can't live only for revenge, you know."

"Oh?" Hisoka's eyes had shut, but he was smiling. "Do you have something better?"

Tsuzuki laughed softly. "Yeah. I'll tell you all about it when you wake up. And maybe after we eat."

"Baka..."

Emboldened by drowsiness or the love directed toward him or a combination of those things, Hisoka put one hand on Tsuzuki's back and snuggled closer to him, pressing his face against the elder's chest. His other fingers brushed Tsuzuki's skin, tapping into the connection between them just long enough to make his own feelings heard. If that defiant, frightened-but-growing-stronger voice had always been there, Hisoka had told the truth, Tsuzuki realized with amazement. He too had been quietly shouting all along.

_I told you. Baka._

_Kid._

Laughter mingled with old and new pains across the bridge between their souls, until Hisoka withdrew into a peaceful sleep. Tsuzuki watched him with relief and contentment and other emotions he couldn't remember from his short, unhappy human life. It shouldn't have been the first time this occurred to Tsuzuki, but both he and Hisoka had been feared and despised as children, both been deprived of adulthoods, both only found acceptance and love after their deaths had freed them. Maybe this was meant to be, if anything ever was. Maybe Meifu was not just a hierarchy filled with departments and budgetary concerns, but a place for the lost to find where they belonged. And who they belonged with.

Smiling, Tsuzuki rested his head on Hisoka's and quietly breathed in. Sakura and blood still lingered on the air, but they wouldn't always.

**THE END**


End file.
